NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said he’s open to overhauling the NBA’s current playoff structure by getting rid of Eastern and Western Conference seeds and just including the best 16 teams.
Finally, TV networks no longer have to worry about airing the sorriest excuse for playoff basketball that is the Eastern Conference playoffs. NBA fans will now be able to watch the BEST teams in the NBA go head-to-head in the playoffs. No longer will there be below .500 teams from the East that make the playoffs over a team from the West that’s got 50 wins.
In Silver’s blueprint for the new playoffs, the six divisional winners will receive automatic bids to the playoffs and the final ten teams would be determined by record, no matter which conference they come from.
Silver recognizes there are some initial setbacks to his idea, but ultimately it will be a great change for the NBA, the TV networks, and of course the fans.
Silver said in a December interview with ESPN’s Andy Katz, “I think that’s the kind of proposal we need to look at. There are travel issues, of course, but in this day and age every team, of course, has their own plane, travels charter … It’s something I’m going to look at closely with the competition committee. A lot of owners have strong feelings on it, but I think it is an area where we need to make a change.”
Adam Silver already had an impactful year one as NBA Commissioner and shows no signs of slowing down in year two, saying, “I don’t think the discussion should end there,” Silver said of potential changes. “And as I’ve said, my first year I was studying a lot of these issues, and Year 2 is time to take action.”
